4/22/12

Artisanal ... Not

The gloves are off for this one, deary.

It seems that trends in foods come and go pretty fast. Just saw a commercial for Duncan Donuts "Artisanal" Bagels.

Artisanal? Right. We can just imagine a marketing meeting where the boss says, "How in the hell are we gonna sell that crap?" And an up and coming junior marketing executive exclaims, "Let's call them 'Artisanal.'" Cooky Cat caught the very fly from that wall and ate it. That evening he dreamed the foregoing scenario. So you know it's for shizlle my culinarizlle.

Seems "Artisanal" is in. So in that, with us, it's out. So "in" that a very bland below the middle of the road product can be upmarketed just by tagging on the word. Or, some earnest aesthete in a trendy Brooklyn neighborhood (or, London), cooking jam and charging $10 for it. But, you say, the jar is a Wech and the label is just so CUTE! You say Wech, we say Wack. Eh! Or, yet another pizza guy with a starter from the Middle Ages, an exclusive contract to get Giuseppe Italiano's hand ground Tuscan valley heirloom organic wheat, and Mozzarella from albino water buffaloes whose udders are hand massaged every evening by lovely Itralian virgins to the music of that other Giuseppe, Verdi. Don't let us even get started on the kind of olive oil a place like that might be touting. Even Rachel Ray's "EVOO" is starting to sound comforting.

TAKE THIS PLEDGE: Repeat after me . . . I will never eat or purchase or patronize anything or place that has "Artisanal" attached to it.

If you need some motivation, given that "Artisanal" is all that and you probably want to be seen as cutting edge and all that yourself, here's something to conjure in your mind's eye whenever you hear "artisanal" mentioned. A line of specialty cheeses made in Williamsberg, Brooklyn with the breast milk of new Hasidic mothers. Hip AND Kosher.Here's the on to clinch the deal:Cooky Cat's fresh juicy hair ball. Now that's artisanal!

Forget "Curiously Refreshing." Leave that to the days when Commander Whitehead was on every television screen touting Schweppes Tonic Water.

(FYI: Commander Edward Whitehead (1908 – 1978) was a British Royal Navy officer, a veteran of the South Pacific campaign, and at one time the President of Schweppes (USA). He is better known as an advertising representative of Schweppes in a campaign created by Ogilvy&Mather Agency in 1955 which ran through the 1960s.)

It's the new century and Cooky Cat is all up into the mystery of things. Also, it happens to be G&T weather. Gin and Tonic, darling, if we have to spell it out.

Here are the quintessential ingredients to give your G&T a most haunting deliciousness. First, let's step up tonic-wise. Top of the line, Fever-Tree Tonic Water. (Tops in price too.)

If you're wondering about the Gin, well we leave it to you. Our Botanist from Islay is too precious for anything other than neat or in a very dry martini. Bombay or Beefeaters will do the trick. A friend suggests Hendricks, but that too is rather nicey and pricey; best savored on its own, as with the aforementioned Botanist.

Now that you've upped your G&T game with the Fever-Tree Tonic, let's consider two additions to get the haunting going spookafragistically.

Either or, but never both: Stirrings Blood Orange Bitters or St. Germain Liqueur crafted with hand gathered elder flowers. The fourth taste that either one of these will contribute to your G&T will raise your refreshing beverage to a level that is, as they say, something completely different.

Just don't put in too much, just enough so you can get a hint of a taste of it in there without being able to put your finger on it. (Like a ghost, get it; "haunting".) Or, like the inestimable Ms. Julia Child would admonish about overdoing the nutmeg: "You don't want so much that people can say, 'Nutmeg!'"